Between Bruises & Blooms

There are cats
fighting in the forest
at four in the morning

and somehow
this is easier
than my own life.

Someone has crossed
a border.

Someone has betrayed
their Clan.

Someone is receiving
a prophecy
that will probably ruin
their entire fucking life.

Perfect.

Give me that.

Give me stars
speaking in riddles.

Give me forbidden love
and leaders
making terrible decisions.

Give me apprentices
running directly
toward danger
despite being told
approximately seventeen times
not to.

Give me anything
except the thoughts
waiting beneath
my pillow.

Because when the forest
fills my ears,

my brain finally
stops narrating
every terrible possibility
of my own.

For a little while

I don't wonder
who is leaving.

Who is angry.

What I forgot.

What tomorrow needs
from me.

I wonder
who survives
the next chapter.

And maybe
it sounds ridiculous—

a grown woman
awake before sunrise
emotionally devastated
over fictional cats.

But those cats
have carried me
through nights

my own mind
was too heavy
to carry alone.

So yes.

Play the next chapter.

The sun can rise
without me.